Annabel Crabb

Comment: Book Reviews

Annabel Crabb and the reviews of Hilary Clinton’s Book, Hard Choices

There’s a good chance that I will not buy Hilary Clinton’s Book, Hard Choices. I admit to not reading any of these large political biographies. I do however often follow the media’s comments on such productions to sense just how the media treats the authors (even if they are mostly ghost writers).

It was with interest that I came upon Annabel Crabb’s little piece in the Canberra Times – Fairfax papers (click here).

Annabel Crabb has developed a following of her writing style whereby she tosses in her form of humour and innuendo. For a while I too found it all somewhat entertaining, especially in the context of the usual styles of political reporting and social commentary.

However over the last couple of years, I have observed her commentary has become not so engaging. You can tell this when you start scanning her articles instead of reading and you quickly moving to other articles. Had they become just too predictable? Has she anything original to contribute? I am wondering about all this.

When I read Annabel Crabb’s comments on Hilary Clinton’s book, I was struck about how the piece struggled to be informative and I queried whether she had read the book. I am now wondering if she has become a parody of herself. These thoughts and reactions promoted me to check online for other reviews.

It seems that the anti-Hilary camp, along with the usual Republican leaning media outlets, had poured scorn on the book almost before the first copies hit the stands. This would have been deliberate to puncture the book’s profile and to set the tone of the reception. However many other reviews did break through with far more considered reviews and quite a bit of intelligent critical analysis.

Having made my way through several of the reviews it was obvious just how much of this level of interesting journalism is missing from Annabel Crab’s little dart throwing exercises. This is a shame as Annabel Crabb was originally looking like a journalist of interest and influence and the population needs as many of these as possible during times of devastation brought on by our political parties. But unfortunately it seems that by continual putting out these fluffy pieces, she intends to escort herself off the stage of engaging writers.

Here’s a typical fence-sitting exercise from a member of the Canberra press gallery – when as a block they totally missed the importance and power of the now international famous misogyny speech by Julia Gillard – click here.

Fence sitters should realise that if you stay up there too long, eventually some damage will be self inflicted, you become uncomfortable, and your ability to engage becomes limited.